José
@cachidiablo.bsky.social
Frágiles relámpagos. I mostly repost interesting things. Books, languages, science and philosophy.
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Reposted by José
Roland Barthes on haiku, out of Empire of Signs (translated by Richard Howard). Oddly, the Shakespeare-attributed line (English in the original) is Wordsworth, Book VI of The Prelude (1850). Isn’t Barthes’s emendatory storm (“Or better still,” “Or again”) its own “permanently alienated definition”?
October 5, 2024 at 9:12 PM
Roland Barthes on haiku, out of Empire of Signs (translated by Richard Howard). Oddly, the Shakespeare-attributed line (English in the original) is Wordsworth, Book VI of The Prelude (1850). Isn’t Barthes’s emendatory storm (“Or better still,” “Or again”) its own “permanently alienated definition”?
Reposted by José
Increase Mather—an odious person justly despised by many of his contemporaries and reviled by his descendants—did sometimes have a point.
"The wise Man doth justly condemn the folly of those, that are always saying and complaining, what is the cause that the former dayes were better than these?"
"The wise Man doth justly condemn the folly of those, that are always saying and complaining, what is the cause that the former dayes were better than these?"
November 21, 2024 at 4:17 PM
Increase Mather—an odious person justly despised by many of his contemporaries and reviled by his descendants—did sometimes have a point.
"The wise Man doth justly condemn the folly of those, that are always saying and complaining, what is the cause that the former dayes were better than these?"
"The wise Man doth justly condemn the folly of those, that are always saying and complaining, what is the cause that the former dayes were better than these?"
Reposted by José
The great translator and poet Michael Hofmann, who has the misfortune to teach in Florida, on the new US regime (from the NYRB blog):
www.nybooks.com/online/2024/...
www.nybooks.com/online/2024/...
![I feel we’ve been circling the drain for months, and now are being rinsed down the plughole. Hello, darkness, my old friend. I’m nauseous and have difficulty breathing. If I looked in the mirror—which I do often these days, purely as a function of disbelief, because I feel I no longer exist—I fancy I would see Ford Madox Ford, a soup-strainer mustache and the appearance of a boiled egg in his mouth, but actually only a gasp because “mustard gassed voiceless some seven miles behind the lines at Nancy or Belleau Wood.” As the poet said. Preserve my words, preserve my words. The wantonness and wickedness of it. I’m sorry for the rest of the world for having something as rancid and pampered and apparently resistless as America in it. Who ever thought male suffrage was a good idea? Come on in, the water’s boiling in this reddened and ever redder and reddening state. Not much meat on these snow crab legs, but you’ll enjoy the crack of your tax cut. Or is it the vertebra of the last surviving trade unionist? It says in our new constitution we’re allowed to hunt and fish. Well, halle-fucking-lujah. And $2 gas a birthright in perpetuity. If only it were some small and out of the way place. Make Armorica Great Again. Make Armorica Great Again. Make Armorica Great Again. But no, this is that shining city, and that last best hope. Gone, all gone. Stick a fork in it. There is only money, bare-faced lies, and evil intentions. The playground inversion of everything. You’re the fascist, you’re the racist, you’re the one threatening me with violence. It’s no consolation, but this country will not know what hit it, and first the low-information electors with their red caps for brains. No overstatement is possible. I feel species disgust. Of course, impetuous. Of course, poet and fine frenzy and all that. Of course, nonsense and hysteria. Oligarchopolis, here we come. Yes, we only live in it. It’s yours, and don’t I know it. [Character limit prevents posting the rest, sorry!]](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:yh57k4bayjoyienjoouwmjh6/bafkreic4jiuganas2m33gcgp5qx5u5v2miz4kegroiptn76imjliengxbe@jpeg)
November 17, 2024 at 7:20 AM
The great translator and poet Michael Hofmann, who has the misfortune to teach in Florida, on the new US regime (from the NYRB blog):
www.nybooks.com/online/2024/...
www.nybooks.com/online/2024/...
Reposted by José
